The 2nd Gen Redemption by _ExpeditionMan
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_ExpeditionMan
Adventurer
They truly are rare. Definitely not as cherished as the 1st gens or as common as 3rd gens. And yeah I have a 31x10.50 right now and think the proportions look good. As much as I would love 33's I don't know if I want to sacrifice the gas mileage or additional rotating mass.
_ExpeditionMan
Adventurer
Prepping for State Inspection
Interestingly in Houston and a few counties in Dallas all OBD1 vehicles older than 1995 (barring the 25 year exception rule) have to go through a "simulated" road test on a dyno for emissions testing. Every place I went to that said they could do it either had a malfunctioning dyno when I showed up or (and I could not believe this) did not have a mechanic who could drive a manual...
So after many struggles I finally found a place that could do it and was immediately told I would not pass due to my emergency brake not stopping the car quickly enough. Since I only had another week and half to get this car inspected, registered, and titled before facing fines from the state I went on a mission to fix my lazy e-brake cable. Originally I assumed that the rear drum brakes were worn and the shoes were not contacting the drums so I swung by Autozone and picked up some new shoes. I pulled off the drums and to my surprise the shoes looked almost brand new! I love it when a previous owner is honest. All the hardware looked good, though I sprayed everything down with brake cleaner and scrubbed some gunk off of the various components. I wish I had taken more photos but I am still getting used to documenting everything. I did notice on the passenger rear drum that there looked to be a very small leak from the brake (wheel) cylinder. It was so small that I consider it inconsequential, I'll just keep my eye on the brake fluid levels and check it again in a few months. It was awesome to get to see the inside of a drum brake, I had only ever been exposed to the workings of disc brakes so the mechanical simplicity of the drum was a welcome surprise.
I had read on a 4Runner forum that one symptom of a weak e-brake was that the shoes needed to be adjusted. Supposedly, you could pull the parking brake handle back and forth and eventually the shoes would contact the drums when the cable was pulled. I tried this and got no results, though I suspect this would work eventually for someone else just not in my case for a reason I will describe later on. Below is a picture of my setup after putting the wheels back on when I figured out the shoes were in good shape.
After tracing the e-brake cables from the rear axle I found the mechanical assembly responsible for engaging the rear shoes when the e-brake handle is pulled (see diagram below). An arm is pulled by the e-brake handle via a cable that runs from the cabin down past the firewall and under the vehicle, the arm then in turn pulls the two separate lines that run to each rear drum to engage the drum brakes.
What I discovered was the the e-brake cable coming from the handle in the cabin to the assembly was stretched, so it was not fully engaging the rear drums even at full stretch. There is no way to adjust this front cable, but luckily Toyota foresaw this and added in an adjustment nut (pictured below). This adjustment nut is actually two 12mm nuts that sandwich the assembly on a threaded rod. utilizing two 12mm wrenches I was able to break each of them loose. If your truck has been up north you may want to spray a penetrating liquid on this as even mine was difficult and it was an Arizona and New Mexico truck. I was able to adjust the rear cables so that they were tight enough that even my stretched front cable could fully engage the rear shoes. It is important to note that if you do this adjustment yourself that you change the location of the adjustment nuts while you have the e-brake handle pulled out. If you adjust the rear shoes to be tight on the drums while the e-brake handle is pushed into the dash (in the disengaged position) then you will be dragging your rear brakes.
Disclaimer: If you follow my instructions and damage your vehicle I am not responsible. If you over tighten the rear cables they can snap. Be smart and take your time.
Interestingly in Houston and a few counties in Dallas all OBD1 vehicles older than 1995 (barring the 25 year exception rule) have to go through a "simulated" road test on a dyno for emissions testing. Every place I went to that said they could do it either had a malfunctioning dyno when I showed up or (and I could not believe this) did not have a mechanic who could drive a manual...
So after many struggles I finally found a place that could do it and was immediately told I would not pass due to my emergency brake not stopping the car quickly enough. Since I only had another week and half to get this car inspected, registered, and titled before facing fines from the state I went on a mission to fix my lazy e-brake cable. Originally I assumed that the rear drum brakes were worn and the shoes were not contacting the drums so I swung by Autozone and picked up some new shoes. I pulled off the drums and to my surprise the shoes looked almost brand new! I love it when a previous owner is honest. All the hardware looked good, though I sprayed everything down with brake cleaner and scrubbed some gunk off of the various components. I wish I had taken more photos but I am still getting used to documenting everything. I did notice on the passenger rear drum that there looked to be a very small leak from the brake (wheel) cylinder. It was so small that I consider it inconsequential, I'll just keep my eye on the brake fluid levels and check it again in a few months. It was awesome to get to see the inside of a drum brake, I had only ever been exposed to the workings of disc brakes so the mechanical simplicity of the drum was a welcome surprise.
I had read on a 4Runner forum that one symptom of a weak e-brake was that the shoes needed to be adjusted. Supposedly, you could pull the parking brake handle back and forth and eventually the shoes would contact the drums when the cable was pulled. I tried this and got no results, though I suspect this would work eventually for someone else just not in my case for a reason I will describe later on. Below is a picture of my setup after putting the wheels back on when I figured out the shoes were in good shape.
After tracing the e-brake cables from the rear axle I found the mechanical assembly responsible for engaging the rear shoes when the e-brake handle is pulled (see diagram below). An arm is pulled by the e-brake handle via a cable that runs from the cabin down past the firewall and under the vehicle, the arm then in turn pulls the two separate lines that run to each rear drum to engage the drum brakes.
What I discovered was the the e-brake cable coming from the handle in the cabin to the assembly was stretched, so it was not fully engaging the rear drums even at full stretch. There is no way to adjust this front cable, but luckily Toyota foresaw this and added in an adjustment nut (pictured below). This adjustment nut is actually two 12mm nuts that sandwich the assembly on a threaded rod. utilizing two 12mm wrenches I was able to break each of them loose. If your truck has been up north you may want to spray a penetrating liquid on this as even mine was difficult and it was an Arizona and New Mexico truck. I was able to adjust the rear cables so that they were tight enough that even my stretched front cable could fully engage the rear shoes. It is important to note that if you do this adjustment yourself that you change the location of the adjustment nuts while you have the e-brake handle pulled out. If you adjust the rear shoes to be tight on the drums while the e-brake handle is pushed into the dash (in the disengaged position) then you will be dragging your rear brakes.
Disclaimer: If you follow my instructions and damage your vehicle I am not responsible. If you over tighten the rear cables they can snap. Be smart and take your time.
_ExpeditionMan
Adventurer
Thanks for the post. Yeah I love this thing. I can't wait to get through all the maintenance items so I can start adding the "fun" stuff
tanglefoot
ExPoseur
Nice work with the E-brake. I've never been able to keep mine working very well. The mechanical arm on one side is usually seized and the other works marginally. I'm glad we don't have those kinds of inspections here.
_ExpeditionMan
Adventurer
New (to me) Parts!
The 4Runner was missing its front skid plate and since I could not justify spending the $200 on a budbuilt one (and do not have the tools to fab one myself) I started looking for a junkyard pull off. I ended up finding a deal on one off a 1st gen for $50 plus shipping from a t4r.org forum member. It is in good shape besides looking rough. Plans are to clean this off, sand any surface rust I find down, and then give it a nice coat of rustoleum. This should do a decent job of protecting vacuum lines from flying rocks and give me basic protection.
I also found a set of used Aisin manual hubs! The parts themselves seem to work fine, though they look quite rough. I plan to rebuild these, paint them, and then replace my auto-locking hubs. The ADD system on my truck is known to have problems engaging so removing this system should make the 4wd system more robust.
The 4Runner was missing its front skid plate and since I could not justify spending the $200 on a budbuilt one (and do not have the tools to fab one myself) I started looking for a junkyard pull off. I ended up finding a deal on one off a 1st gen for $50 plus shipping from a t4r.org forum member. It is in good shape besides looking rough. Plans are to clean this off, sand any surface rust I find down, and then give it a nice coat of rustoleum. This should do a decent job of protecting vacuum lines from flying rocks and give me basic protection.
I also found a set of used Aisin manual hubs! The parts themselves seem to work fine, though they look quite rough. I plan to rebuild these, paint them, and then replace my auto-locking hubs. The ADD system on my truck is known to have problems engaging so removing this system should make the 4wd system more robust.
_ExpeditionMan
Adventurer
Thanks tanglefoot. They are a pain! I will say having a functional e-brake did help me with some hill starts when I took the truck to a ORV park this weekend.
_ExpeditionMan
Adventurer
Manual Hubs and new CVs
During my trip to the Hidden Falls Adventure Park (look for a trip report soon!) with Expedition Portal Members jgilbreath and ADVW/Liam I started hearing popping noises during turning in 4WD. After stopping on the trail ADVW/Liam spotted the problem. Both of my outboard CV boots were split open, but could only be seen when the wheels were at full lock. I took it easy through the rest of the day at the park and purchased new CVs at Autozone and started the install during Christmas week.
I prepped for this service by pulling together a few guides online and keeping a PDF of an 88 4Runner FSM manual by my side. I also enlisted the help of my Father, without whom I would never have completed the job. No matter what I did I could not get the old CV shafts out. They would just not slide off of the studs they were seated on; this would have been so much easier if these were bolts Toyota!! I spent an embarrassing amount of time struggling with this until I took a short break for lunch, put aside the guides, and decided to try something on my own.
Here is what I did (skipping some miscellaneous steps):
This was a total pain, but since I now have a process I am confident that next time I could knock it out in just a few hours.
During this install I took the opportunity to tear down, paint, and rebuild a pair of used Aisin Manual Hubs I picked up a few weeks ago. I purchased new gaskets from a local Toyota Service department and re-used the mounting hardware that was already on my truck. I was amazed at the simplicity of the Manual Hubs, the rebuild and install were very straight forward. Below is the only picture I took during the ordeal, I was pretty frustrated at the time haha. Feels good to be making progress on maintenance items and to finally install a mod that is both functional and fun.
During my trip to the Hidden Falls Adventure Park (look for a trip report soon!) with Expedition Portal Members jgilbreath and ADVW/Liam I started hearing popping noises during turning in 4WD. After stopping on the trail ADVW/Liam spotted the problem. Both of my outboard CV boots were split open, but could only be seen when the wheels were at full lock. I took it easy through the rest of the day at the park and purchased new CVs at Autozone and started the install during Christmas week.
I prepped for this service by pulling together a few guides online and keeping a PDF of an 88 4Runner FSM manual by my side. I also enlisted the help of my Father, without whom I would never have completed the job. No matter what I did I could not get the old CV shafts out. They would just not slide off of the studs they were seated on; this would have been so much easier if these were bolts Toyota!! I spent an embarrassing amount of time struggling with this until I took a short break for lunch, put aside the guides, and decided to try something on my own.
Here is what I did (skipping some miscellaneous steps):
- Remove the front stabilizer bar (Pull the four retaining bolts on the frame and the seats the bar rides on, then remove the nut from the bottom of each control arm where the stabilizer bar stud is retained)
*Note* People online will say to remove the steering knuckle, shocks, and tons of other things if you could not get the CV out. No. Do not waste your time. Remove the stabilizer bar to allow more flex and you should be able to slide it out. - Jack the front of the 4Runner up
- Pull CV as far down as possible trying to slip the mounting points on the CV between the studs that are in your way
- Put the wheels back on if they are off (make sure to tighten down all associate mounting hardware before putting any load on the suspension)
- Stack ~8" of stone tile under one wheel
- Slowly lower 4Runner onto pile allowing front suspension to flex and put pressure on the opposite side bringing the lower control arm close to parallel with the ground
- Wiggle CV joint loose and out
- Switch to the other side and repeat
This was a total pain, but since I now have a process I am confident that next time I could knock it out in just a few hours.
During this install I took the opportunity to tear down, paint, and rebuild a pair of used Aisin Manual Hubs I picked up a few weeks ago. I purchased new gaskets from a local Toyota Service department and re-used the mounting hardware that was already on my truck. I was amazed at the simplicity of the Manual Hubs, the rebuild and install were very straight forward. Below is the only picture I took during the ordeal, I was pretty frustrated at the time haha. Feels good to be making progress on maintenance items and to finally install a mod that is both functional and fun.
odonekanobe
Observer
In the future replace those studs with bolts. It makes it much easier to change out the CV's.
_ExpeditionMan
Adventurer
Yeah I mentioned that in my post. Wish Toyota had done that in the first place! Any ideas on how to press those studs out?
odonekanobe
Observer
Well since I wasn't planning on reusing them I just used one of my long impact extensions in reverse. That way they fit over the head of the stud and every hit will count. Even then I don't think any damage was done to them.
I have the Blazeland long travel on my second gen. Had to change out a CV and never even took the wheel off. It was so easy and nice!
I have the Blazeland long travel on my second gen. Had to change out a CV and never even took the wheel off. It was so easy and nice!
_ExpeditionMan
Adventurer
Well next time I am taking those dang studs out then. They were easily the worst part about the job. If they were bolts I could have been done in an hour.
_ExpeditionMan
Adventurer
Trip report coming soon
I organized a trip out to Hidden Falls Adventure Park with two awesome guys off of this forum. I will have a trip report up and more details plus lots of photos soon!
Here is a teaser shot:
I organized a trip out to Hidden Falls Adventure Park with two awesome guys off of this forum. I will have a trip report up and more details plus lots of photos soon!
Here is a teaser shot:
tanglefoot
ExPoseur
Nice work with the methodology. I've never had the *joy* of working on CVs.
I'm a huge fan of the Aisin hubs.
I can't get enough photos of a stock Yoats on the trails. Looks like brochure photography!
I'm a huge fan of the Aisin hubs.
I can't get enough photos of a stock Yoats on the trails. Looks like brochure photography!